The newly elected Prime Minister of UK, Keir Starmer has said he wants to reduce the number of people going to prison through renewed efforts to cut reoffending.
In his first press conference as prime minister, Sir Keir said too many people found themselves back in jail relatively quickly after being sent there.
He added that intervening to prevent young people from committing knife crime would be an early priority for his new government.
But according to him, there would be no overnight solution to prison overcrowding, adding that they have got too many prisoners but not enough prisons.
In his words, “We do need to be clear about the way in which we use prisons.
“For so many people [who] come out of prison, they’re back in prison relatively quickly afterwards.
“That is a massive problem that we have in this country, that we do need to break.”
Starmer said his party wanted to cut knife crime in particular, and cited his plan to set up a network of “youth hubs”.
Sir Keir, a former lawyer, added: “I’ve sat in the back of I don’t know how many criminal courts and watched people processed through the system on an escalator to go into prison.
“I’ve often reflected that many of them could have been taken out of that system earlier if they’d had support.”
BBC NEWS
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